what happens in the end

He stages one last robbery, and she chooses to do the job she was hired to do and intercept him at the cemetery. Meanwhile, he's taking off for Europe, where the rest of his money is. He leaves her a message to the effect that if she really wants to be with him, she'll follow him there. But he probably doesn't believe it.


"Sorry. I wasn't listening, or thinking, whichever one applies."

Two brilliant and charismatic people are bored with life. Their success comes to them too easily. When they meet they play a game with one another. The game is one of intelligence and power. The final round of the game is to see if Vicki will do things Thomas Crown's way or insist on her own.

Vicki wants to win the game. She wants to be the detective who caught Thomas Crown. She also wants to be his partner and travel the world with him having adventures and taking risks. In the end she betrays him.

Crown wants to win the game, too. He gives Vicki information about his planned heist to see is she can be trusted. He enjoys Vicki as a companion but he wants to be the dominant partner.

They don't have a love story in the classic sense. This is not a movie involving selfless true love. They are attracted to one another because they are alike in ego and passion.

Vicki chooses to use the power Crown has given her to prove her dominance over him. She achieves money and a reputation as a great detective; but she loses the most exciting lover she will ever find. She weeps.

Crown escapes without the money -- he had the money dropped at the cemetery as planned but he flew out of the country to avoid the police. He has millions of dollars of his own and is going to enjoy the world. If Vicki had been at the cemetery alone, according to the plan they agreed upon, she could have brought the bank robbery loot and gone away with Crown. Because she arrived at the cemetery with the police prepared to arrest Crown she showed she couldn't be trusted. Crown has lost the only woman equal to him. The only one who would never bore him. Someone who would have taken risks and enjoyed them. He will survive quite nicely with plenty of money, no need to work and all the beautiful women, cars, planes, boats and horses in the world. He smiles.

Some serious misunderstandings here, possibly related to the (relative) youth of those writing....

At the end of the movie, Thomas Crown is not on his way to Europe. He is flying to Brazil where he will be beyond the reach of US law enforcement--no extradition treaty. There he will have access to his Swiss bank account. But at the end of the story, he is busted as far as the USA is concerned--the first robbery was, at the time, a very big score (over $2m) and the law enforcement crowd waiting for him at the cemetery have the full story. The driver of the Ford station wagon (woody) from the first robbery, for example, has sung well and truly.

Crown's personal dilemma may seem, today, fairly non-sensical--we live in a radically different time. Although released in 1968, the world view and basic philosophical assumptions underlying the story are from the post-Fifties, pre-Sixties interregnum period when it was written. And although the director, Norman Jewison, alludes to elements of 'rebellion' in the protagonist's character, it may be useful to recall that Crown himself, during the golf match in which his ennui is most apparent, clearly states that his problem is finding out who he will be tommorrow.

This is a reference to post-war philosophical concerns related to Existentialism. This is now defunct. But at the time, these questions were discussed in terms of "authenticity," for example, or "identity" (Crown's own usage). These concerns, in an era of "lifestyle" whereby one simply purchases a persona, are now gone. Small wonder people now are puzzled. The zeitgeist is simply no longer there.

See also the second remake--largely a matter of conspicuous consumption. Hopeless.

Thomas Crown may be very rich and Faye Dunaway spectacularly beautiful and intelligent. But the reason the film resounds is that these characters have very real concerns, dealt with artfully but in some considerable depth in the story. There is no equivalent today. It isn't even discussed. You simply go shopping.

When Vicki (Dunnaway) was in the back seat of the police car she was really worried. Either Thomas Crown(McQueen) would show up which meant he loved her and trusted her, but then he would go to jail for life. Or he would not show up, meaning he didn't love her. But he found a third way out, first she saw the car and depressedly accepted that he loved her, but then the telegram was a joke, saying "HAHA, I just tricked you with the funeral talk, and I do love you, but I'm not gonna be tricked by you either, so instead of you asking me if you love me I'm still asking YOU, without compromising your (possible) love or your personal integrity"

I think Crown was the first to realize that they had reached a stalemate in their relationship. They are both the same type, they both want to win. Unlike Vicki, who still has some morality, Crown has none. He is too cynical for that and he won't turn honest to win her over with a little jail time. He knows that Vicki will eventually adhere to honesty and sell him out.

And he was right? Wasn't he?

However, that smile in the end is very sad. You have to compare it to his insane laughter after the first heist.

Thomas Crown loves Vicki. She is the only person he loves more than he loves himself. And he has lost her forever.

So she had a choice. Collect the money and follow Thomas Crowne to paradise or call the police and catch Thomas in the act of collecting the money.
So her decision was "good or evil"? What was she really?
She choose to call the police knowing she would lose Thomas but kept her alignment of "good".
Thomas left the choice up to her so he would not have to get caught.

Remember the line early in the movie which he basically said don't do anything you can't walk away from in 30 seconds flat.

DiNero's character in Heat said basically the same thing.